A Look Inside The Yankee Universe (and around the world of baseball)

Game 12: Rangers vs. Yankees

The Yankees look to keep on a roll as they bring their first home stand of the season to a close with Andy Pettitte on the mound. They will be opposed by Rangers’ starter Rich Harden, who has not begun a game against the Yankees since April 15, 2007 when he was with the Oakland A’s. In that game, made famous by Marco Scutaro’s walk off home run against Mariano Rivera, Harden also matched up against Pettitte. Despite pitching well, he had to leave early because of an injury, a trend that has become a reoccurring theme in Harden’s career. Look for the Yankees to once again use their patient approach to get into the Rangers’ bullpen early. Harden, never know for efficiency, has thrown 90 and 104 pitches in 3 2/3 and 6 innings, respectively.

vs. Rich Harden

PA

BA

OBP

SLG

HR

RBI

Brett Gardner LF

0

0.000

0.000

0.000

0

0

NickJohnson DH

3

0.000

0.000

0.000

0

1

Mark Teixeira 1B

30

0.222

0.300

0.259

0

0

Alex Rodriguez 3B

22

0.300

0.364

0.500

1

1

RobinsonCano 2B

9

0.111

0.111

0.222

0

0

Jorge Posada C

17

0.200

0.294

0.200

0

2

Curtis Granderson CF

6

0.333

0.333

0.833

1

1

Nick Swisher RF

2

0.000

0.500

0.000

0

0

Ramiro Pena SS

0

0.000

0.000

0.000

0

0

Total

89

0.2222

0.2809

0.333

2

5

vs. Andy Pettitte

PA

BA

OBP

SLG

HR

RBI

Elvis Andrus SS

5

0.500

0.800

0.500

0

0

Mike Young 3B

34

0.259

0.353

0.333

0

5

Josh Hamilton CF

6

0.500

0.500

1.000

1

2

Vladimir Guerrero DH

24

0.391

0.417

0.522

0

1

Nelson Cruz RF

12

0.111

0.333

0.111

0

1

Ryan Garko 1B

6

0.333

0.333

0.333

0

0

David Murphy LF

9

0.500

0.556

1.000

1

3

Matt Treanor C

0

0.000

0.000

0.000

0

0

Andres Blanco 2B

0

0.000

0.000

0.000

0

0

Total

96

0.333

0.417

0.481

2

12

On this date in 1923, the original Yankee Stadium opened its doors for the first time. In the game against Boston, Bob Shawkey pitched a complete game and Babe Ruth homered to lead the Yankees to a 4-1 victory.

By beating the Rangers on Saturday, the Yankees assured themselves of four straight series wins to start a season. Incredibly, that had not been accomplished since 1926, when the team won its first five series.

Derek Jeter, suffering the effects of a head cold, is not in the lineup for the first time this season. Starting in his place is Ramiro Pena, the last Yankee position player to be in the pre-game lineup. The Captain must really be feeling under the weather to miss a game against Harden (.375/.500/.500 in 21 PAs).

Alex Rodriguez finally passed Mark McGwire for sole possession of 8th place on the All-time HR list. The opposite field blast was number 584 for Arod. It also snapped a career long 10-game homerless streak at the start of a season. Arod also went 10 opening games without a HR in 2001, but then went on to hit 52.

Jorge Posada’s second inning hit in yesterday’s game was number 1,500 in his Yankee career, making him only the 19th player and 4th catcher in franchise history to accomplish the milestone.